iFlix or Netflix? Which Streaming Provider is Positioned to Win Southeast Asia?

Ever since Netflix made the pivot from a DVD mail-order business to streaming video-on-demand (SVOD), it’s been besieged by the likes of Hulu, Amazon Prime Video, and free-to-stream sites like Pluto.tv that have tried to play catch up.

They realized the future of video streaming was primarily via on-demand.

Part of the reason is the shift of consumption patterns towards the internet. Millennials have brought the cord-cutting phenomenon to the mainstream and they’re no longer interested in 24/7 cable television but would rather stream sports, movies, and shows on their own devices.

Asia Pacific is viewed as a laggard to this dynamic. The proliferation of cheap, pirated DVDs plugged the problem of access to the latest Western movies and TV shows. But the web changed everything: as more households came online, Asian consumers warmed to the idea of watching content directly on their phones.

The dawn of a new era?

The benefits of SVOD are undeniable. There’s a far richer user interface and experience than linear television. Streaming devices also aren’t clunky and fixed to a certain place like a television is and with Asian consumers flocking to smartphones, the opportunity to sidestep television directly is very real.

According to App Annie, the time APAC consumers spent consuming video on their phones grew by 300% between 2015 and 2017. This ferocious rate of growth was double the global average in the same time period.

Asians are consuming a lot of video. Source: App Annie

While impossible to quantify the effect of this systemic shift on the Asian pirated DVD market, it’s fair to say that purchasing DVD players is going out of vogue, especially with younger consumers.

A rapid surge of wireless high-speed broadband networks and mobile data connections mean users have a wider library of content to choose from, and more channels from which to acquire it i.e. YouTube, torrents, and streaming services like Netflix, iFlix, HOOQ, ViKi, Viu, & others.

The SVOD market was valued at US$51.6 billion in 2016 and projected to grow by an annual rate of 8.93% until 2022, eventually settling at US$86.1 billion.

North America will occupy the largest market share, but the majority of growth will be driven by Asia Pacific.

Goes to show why players like Netflix & iFlix are doubling down on their efforts to win over the Asian consumer.

The race for dominance is on

For its part, iFlix, which has raised $300 million and counts companies like UK’s Sky Television as investors, explains that the very reason for its existence is to switch consumers over from pirated DVDs to licensed content.

Comparisons to Netflix are inevitable, but the Kuala Lumpur-headquartered startup has tried to downplay this impression.

CEO Mark Britt told TechCrunch that the two streaming companies don’t share the same target audience.

iFlix, with its price point of about US$3/month caters to the mass market, while Netflix, which is significantly more expensive at about US$10/month is trying to capture the “global elite”, he affirmed.

The Malay company, which now operates in 25 countries across Asia, the Middle East, and Africa, relies on local teams to lock in licensing deals and enhanced payment options via partnerships with telcos & banks.

That’s radically different than Netflix, which allows anyone around the world to sign up (excluding China, North Korea, & Syria) provided they have a functional credit card. This factor alone precludes the overwhelming majority of consumers in Southeast Asia (excluding Singapore).

Netflix understands this bottleneck towards acquiring new users. During a visit to Singapore in 2016, CEO Reed Hastings told journalists that they need to start offering more payment options in markets where there’s low credit card density.

It’s been almost two years since that visit without significant developments.

Netflix did partner with Lazada to offer six months of free streaming with every Live Up membership – opening itself to an affluent population and more points of entry into ASEAN as Live Up is introduced in other markets.

But so far the streaming giant hasn’t adopted any hyperlocal strategies for each specific country.

It certainly doesn’t seem like it’s preventing the company from continuing to scale into unchartered territory. Only last month, it was officially valued at US$100 billion after declaring that it added over 6 million new subscribers in Q4 2017, reaching 117.58 million subscribers globally.

While iFlix doesn’t publicly reveal its total subscriber base, but chairman Patrick Grove told Hollywood Reporter that they expected to breach the 5 million mark in 2017.

So iFlix has a more hyper-localized strategy, is focused on mass-market consumers, and offers a number of flexible payment options. On the other hand, Netflix is relatively expensive, needs a fast and stable internet connection, but offers better content, HD quality video, and popular original programming.

Which streaming provider is winning over consumers in Southeast Asia?

Our survey results

ecommerceIQ initiated an online survey with majority of respondents from the Philippines and Indonesia. For full transparency, overall sample size was small, but the insights generated are fairly discerning.

Let’s repeat the prior assumptions that we outlined. Senior executives at iFlix believe their product is skewed towards the mass market and tailor-made for viewing on mobile devices with slower internet speeds.

This is why iFlix allows users to download content on their phones in order to view it later. It also deliberately keeps prices low to reach an audience that may not be able to afford Netflix.

42.4% of survey respondents said Netflix is their go-to video streaming platform of choice. A similar number chose YouTube. iFlix was actually tied with Viu (which is focused on providing Asian content such as Korean TV and anime) – with 6.2% each.

Both countries have low rates of credit card penetration. There were 8 million people who had credit cards in Indonesia, which translates into just 3.2% of the population. The Philippines actually follows the same trend when judged in percentage terms; 3 million credit card holders in 2015, representing roughly 3% of the population.

Despite structural bottlenecks, the data seems to show that Southeast Asian consumers will find a way to pay for the service if they truly desire it.

iFlix has partnerships with local telcos and banks; users can opt to pay from prepaid mobile phone balance and bundle data deals from their provider.

But only 3% of survey respondents actually said they would like to see more payment options and no one indicated that the reason for choosing a provider in the first place was because of ease of making a payment.

It gets more interesting.

Only 9.1% of respondents said a cheap price point was the reason to opt for the platform in the first place. That makes iFlix’s value proposition a relatively weak factor in winning over the Asian consumer.

The ability to download content to watch later ranked as the highest priority for them, followed closely by access to a large range of Western entertainment, original productions, and an excellent user experience.

12.1% said they opted for their video streaming platform of choice because of its range of local television shows and movies, putting it at 5th priority overall.

The insights slightly negate messages from senior executives at iFlix. CEO and co-founder of iFlix Mark Britt told Variety last year that “almost every assumption about subscription video-on-demand that is based on Western metaphors has failed in developing markets […] we are learning those lessons quicker than others.”

But is that view correct? Our findings seem to indicate that streaming media consumption in Asia isn’t a whole lot different than Western habits.

Research from eMarketer in 2017 said iFlix trailed Viu in Indonesia. The same report said iFlix was marginally ahead of Netflix, but the results could have been skewed because Netflix was blocked for a long time prior to the publishing of the study.

Source: eMarketer

eMarketer also quoted AIP Corporation and said that 39% of Filipinos with an internet subscription had signed up for iFlix, but the corresponding figure for Netflix was much higher, at 60%.

What’s the takeaway?

Southeast Asian consumers might be price conscious but they’re willing to pay a premium for services that add value to their lives. The Netflix brand is known for a vast library of content. The recommendation engine is intuitive and strives to understand a user’s preferences.

The results are also consistent with our analysis of the ride hailing space in Indonesia where consumers don’t simply opt for the cheapest player – they are willing to pay for a comfortable, safe ride, and an enhanced user experience.

The Netflix marketing and product teams have also invested considerable time and resources to build an aspirational brand through social proof, and storytelling.

Its original series such as ‘House of Cards’, ‘Stranger Things’, ‘Orange is the New Black, & ‘Master of None’ command far higher viewership figures than any other SVOD providers. The term ‘Netflix and Chill’ is almost household parlance now.

When consumers sign up for Netflix they gain social validation: they can share updates on Facebook, tell their friends, and be able to participate in discussions about latest episodes. Sure, iFlix is cheaper but can it engender the same kind of excitement?